


Sound & Color

by swwf17



Series: We Should Come with a Warning [1]
Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Family Feels, Fluff, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-19
Updated: 2017-04-19
Packaged: 2018-10-21 00:03:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,919
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10673499
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/swwf17/pseuds/swwf17
Summary: There are very few problems in life that can’t be solved with some glow-in-the-dark stars.





	Sound & Color

**Author's Note:**

> 'family feels' is apparently a preexisting tag, I had no idea.

The glasses are, for the most part, a Very Good Thing.

Kara doesn’t have to be as careful when she’s wearing the glasses. When the lead-lined frames settle across the bridge of her nose, the world becomes less intrusive, and she has room to focus  her efforts on other things, like finishing her math homework (easy) and not embarrassing Alex in front of her friends (less so).

She gets used to their comforting weight and the relative freedom they afford, so much so that she’s almost able to forget about her powers completely.

But every night, just before bed, she has to take them off. The sudden rush of stimuli is always overwhelming—disorienting, really. She has to blink and take a few measured breaths as she pushes away the sounds of the interstate, the dog five blocks over, Eliza and Jeremiah’s heartbeats.

They assure her that one day she won’t _need_ the glasses. She nods and smiles in agreement when they tell her, even as the words send a ripple of unease through her body. The thought of facing the world without the glasses is a wholly unpleasant one. She has to concentrate so _hard_ to make sure she doesn’t accidentally start staring straight through stuff, or picking up on conversations in the next town.

She begrudgingly admits that she’s too dependent on them, and that it’s probably for the best that she can’t actually sleep in them. (Which isn’t to say she hasn’t tried…)

Tonight, she sighs and places them carefully on the nightstand, making sure they’re well out of range of the alarm clock.

Alex mumbles a perfunctory ‘good night’ and turns off the desk lamp, deliberately rolling on her side so as to avoid any potential conversation with Kara. Not that Kara’s feeling up to talking—she’s _really_ tired.

And _really_ tired means her tenuous control slips. She picks up the neighbor’s TV set (they always watch a show about some woman named Lucy, around this time of night) and some indistinct music, which might be coming from the gas station near the freeway on-ramp. She frowns, and focuses on getting the noises to fade. It works, but the ceiling overhead gives way to the starry night sky.

That, she doesn’t mind as much.

And she’s worn out from school and ignoring the neighbor’s TV show, so she allows herself to stare at the unfamiliar constellations.

Alex catches her. Literally spacing out.

“Did you not have smoke detectors on Krypton?” She asks, voice laced with sarcasm, but it doesn’t have the same sort of bite Kara has come to associate with the other kids at school.

Kara blinks, eyesight returning to…something a little more normal than x-ray, or telescopic, but only just.

“Ours didn’t have the little blinking red light,” Kara tells her, sneaking a glance in Alex’s direction. She catches the leap of her eyebrows; Kara’s only _just_ started feeling comfortable enough to exchange jokes, and from the looks of it, Alex is impressed.

She’s quick to hide it, though, rolling her eyes and lying flat on her back. She tucks her arms behind her head. “Is that really all you were doing? Staring at the ceiling? Because you had that…look.”

“Huh?”

“You kinda…your face gets a little weird, when your powers act up.”

This is news to Kara, but then, not all that surprising. It would explain why some of the kids at school point and snicker. “Oh.” She scratches her nose absently. “Is it a bad weird?”

“No. Just regular weird.”

“I wasn’t staring at the smoke detector,” Kara admits. Alex is kind enough to hold back her reflexive _no, really?_ “Without the glasses I sometimes…accidentally see through stuff? So. I was looking at the stars.”

“…Oh.”

“It’s nice…there aren’t any people up there. I don’t have to worry about seeing anyone’s spleen.” Kara pauses. “Did I get that right? Is it called a spleen?”

“Yes.”

“That sounds fake.”

“So does 'Snagriff.'” Kara giggles at Alex’s butchered pronunciation. “What?”

“Nothing.”

“Right.” She’s not convinced, and Kara’s smothered laughter isn’t exactly helping her case, but Alex decides to change the subject. “How far can you see?” She’s genuinely curious.

And Kara’s prior exhaustion flees, because carrying on a pleasant conversation with Alex is still something of a rarity, and thus, a thrill. “Farther than your dad’s telescope,” her answer is a little vague, but only because she hasn’t quite grasped Earth’s measurements of distance just yet. The conversions are…tricky. “But the light pollution—is that the right phrase?”

“Yeah.”

“It makes it hard to see anything.”

“Makes sense.”

“I really want to find…the bear one. Ursa.”

“Well, _which_ Ursa? Major or Minor?”

“Um. Either?”

Alex snorts.

“Well. It’s not the right month for Minor. I’d have to check on Major.” She hears Kara’s head move against the pillow, and can imagine her nodding. “We can…both check. Tomorrow, maybe. Borrow dad’s computer for a bit.” When she turns her head, she’s not the least bit surprised to see Kara grinning ear to ear, and simultaneously trying to play it off like it’s No Big Deal, this offer to spend time with her. Of her own volition. _Without_ obvious prodding from her mother.

It’s with barely contained enthusiasm that Kara says, “That’d be cool.” And because Alex just can’t get over how…fortuitous? coincidental? it is, that their small alien refugee is just as nerdy as the rest of the Danvers clan, she has to ask.

“Were you this much of an astronomy geek, back on Krypton?” Her parents don’t ask Kara about her life before crash landing on Earth. They tread lightly around the subject, treating Kara like she’ll break, or something, if they edge too close.

Alex has seen Kara dent the lockers at school and hastily bend them back into place without so much as a backwards glance. She simply can’t imagine Kara as something fragile.

Whether or not Kara appreciates Alex’s blunt approach, though, is hard to figure. She hasn’t protested yet, though.  

“Most everyone was,” there’s a rustling of fabric that suggests a shrug. She waits for Kara to elaborate. When she doesn’t, Alex attempts to nudge the conversation along.

“Betcha didn’t have any bear constellations, huh?”

“Are there bears around here?” Kara’s change of subject isn’t severe enough to give Alex pause, so she doesn’t think twice before answering.

“No.” Much as Alex wants to add an exasperated huff to her response, she holds back. It’s the kind of question that make Kara something of an easy target at school, but she has to tell herself that it’s better that Kara asks here and now. (Well. Maybe not _now_ exactly; it’s pretty late.)

“But you have birds.” Kara recites it more than asks.

“Birds are…pretty much all over the place, yeah.”

“That’s so neat,” Kara murmurs, and Alex can tell by the soft tone of her voice that she’s smiling, and how can you possibly be exasperated with someone who finds such simple pleasure in the fact that _birds_ exist? (Alex is dismayed to discover that the answer is: you can’t.)

Alex is about to tease her (just a little; it’s good for her, builds character, and all that) but Kara tells her that they should probably go to sleep.

“Why, you tired?” Kara’s yawn should be answer enough, but Kara hastily rolls over on her side and tugs the covers up, dropping her voice as she says,

“Nah, Jeremiah’s heart rate changed, he’s gonna—”

“Girls, it’s a _school night,”_ her dad hollers from down the hall. “Go to _sleep.”_

“…Night Kara.”

“Night Alex.”

* * *

The next morning, they’re eating breakfast (a bowl of cereal for Alex, five slices of toast with peanut butter for Kara) when Eliza asks them what was so pressing that they felt they had to discuss it at eleven o'clock at night.

“Just school stuff,” Kara says around a mouthful of toast.

Alex blinks. Did Kara just…lie?

And Eliza backs off, mistaking Kara’s fidgeting and inability to meet her eyes as a sign that she doesn’t wish to elaborate (honestly not a far-fetched conclusion to draw, considering how the school year has gone thus far) and Alex realizes, suddenly, that Kara never answered her question about the stars.

* * *

Later in the week, the two girls find themselves at the local department store with Eliza, on the hunt for a new alarm clock—Kara’s third in just as many weeks.

“I…don’t think that one comes in reinforced steel,” the store employee’s saying. “…But it has a radio?”

Alex opts to wanders down the aisle as Eliza patiently explains the need for something a bit more durable than plastic. She knows, by this point, that Kara will wander after her automatically—a small Kryptonian shadow. They pass the desk lamps, throw pillows, and brightly colored comforters featuring characters that Kara would probably recognize, if she’d grown up on Earth. As it is, though, the small yellow rodent with the zigzag tail doesn’t mean much to her.

Alex makes sure not to go too far—her mom has the tendency to fret—so once they reach the end of the aisle, she halts, eyeing the end display.

More alarm clocks. Piggy banks. Chia Pets. And a bin on the bottom marked 'clearance,’ mostly filled with what looks like junk.

Except.

There’s a black cardboard box with a picture of the Milky Way galaxy on it, and Alex thinks about the fact that she looks up at the night sky and takes the familiar sight for granted; Kara doesn’t have that luxury.

She doesn’t bother to check the bright orange price tag as she stoops and grabs the package; she has money from tutoring and walking the neighbor’s dog. (“He looks like Krypto!” “He looks like what now?” “My uncle’s dog.” “You guys had _dogs_ but no _birds,_ sure, yeah, okay.”) The small box won’t set her back too far.

Kara eyes her and the box with open curiosity.

“What’s that?”

“Don’t worry about it.”

“But—”

Fortunately, her mom appears at that moment with a clock that Kara promises to try _very hard_ not to smash.

Alex waits for Kara to walk on ahead before she slips the box into the cart, strategically placed behind the corn flakes and printer paper.

Her mom raises an eyebrow, and Alex shrugs.

“For Kara,” she says.

* * *

“You got…stars?”

Kara and Alex stand in the middle of their room, Alex with her hands shoved into her pockets, Kara’s head bent to read the label on the box that Alex unceremoniously tossed in her direction not five minutes prior.

“You stick 'em to the ceiling,” Alex explains, trying not to feel too sheepish. She had been expecting…well. She doesn’t know what, exactly, just. A little less outright confusion, and maybe a little more enthusiasm.

This is, after all, the same girl who gets excited over pigeons.

“…Okay…” Kara says, waiting for Alex to go on.

“They’re…kinda for little kids, actually,” Alex admits. “But I just thought…you might wanna, I dunno. We could make Kryptonian constellations, or whatever.” Kara’s not reacting the way she’d hoped, and as such, her resolve diminishes with each word. ( _Maybe this is it,_  she thinks. She’s finally crossed a line.) “Or, not. We could…do other shapes or. Not put 'em up at all or—”

Kara tilts her head to one side, like she’s deciding something. Then, “Hang on.” She carefully gives the box back to Alex, who watches as Kara hops on her bed and reaches over to the other side, the one closest to the wall. Tucked in the narrow space is a stack of half-used notebooks Alex gave her (after some…healthy encouragement from her parents, anyway) to draw in.

Kara pulls out the ratty green spiral bound book that Alex used for history last year, and flips open to one of the pages towards the back.

The tight apprehension in Alex’s stomach loosens at the sight of a messy star chart.

“This…this is what I remember,” Kara explains. “It’s not as good as a sunstone record, but—”

“It’ll work,” Alex assures her.

And it does.

* * *

The sun’s low in the sky by the time they finish. Kara sits on her bed, while Alex flops back on her own to admire their handy work.

“They’re…kinda hard to see,” Kara observes, squinting at the little plastic stars. Alex smirks.

“They’re glow-in-the-dark, dork.”

“Oh.”

There’s a pause.

“That means we’ll be able to see them better at night.”

“ _Oh._ So, just like the real thing.”

“Yeah. I guess.”

And though she tries very hard to hide it, Alex can tell Kara is anxious for night to fall—the good kind of anxious. The kind of anxious that has her constantly checking the clock, looking out the window to gauge how dark it is.

Alex laughs and shakes her head. The _nerd._

(Alex, of course, is just as eager, but she’ll never admit it.)

Homework is finished, dinner is eaten, several episodes of _Rocky and Bullwinkle_ are consumed. And then, _finally,_ it’s time for bed, and sufficiently dark.

“Okay, time to see if this turned out alright,” Alex says, climbing into bed and reaching for the lamp. Kara nods enthusiastically, gently placing her glasses next to her (new, slightly ridiculous, but tough enough for a construction work site) DeWalt clock radio. There’s a brief flash of discomfort on her face, and Alex knows she’s sorting through more than a dozen sounds and quite possibly sights, if her x-ray vision is acting up, but soon enough, she’s grinning in Alex’s direction, waiting for her to turn out the light.

Alex clicks off the desk lamp, and…

Well. It’s a bunch of little plastic glow-in-the-dark stars. It’s not all that impressive, if she’s being entirely honest.

But you’d never know it, looking at Kara’s wide, delighted grin.

“Sooo…” Alex says, lying back. “Did we do an okay job?”

“Yeah,” she can hear Kara’s smile and just the slightest bit of awe. “It’s…it’s good.”

Alex allows herself a moment of pride. She’s getting the hang of this sister thing. Sort of. Kara still drives her crazy, a lot of the time, but she’s heard that’s typically the case between siblings.

There’s a lengthy stretch of silence—it’s long enough that Alex assumes Kara’s asleep. But then, just as she feels her own eyelids growing heavy, Kara finally answers her question, from the night before.

“No bear constellations,” she says. And it takes a minute, for Alex to remember, but then, sensing that this is…important, probably, she shifts so that she can see Kara, though Kara’s gaze is fixed firmly on the ceiling. “Mostly the old Kryptonian gods. My aunt…” Kara’s voice goes quiet, and ever-so-slightly strained. She has to clear her throat to continue. “Used to teach me. My parents…their jobs were important. They’d be gone a lot, so. To keep my mind off missing them…we’d look at the stars. She told me where the patterns were, which shapes made what.”

Alex is admittedly surprised by Kara’s mention of an aunt; she’s only ever talked about her mom and dad. But of course, she’d have to have an aunt, and an uncle, Alex realizes. Superman had to come from somewhere, right?

“Did they have names?” Alex asks. “The constellations, I mean. Or…I guess the gods…?”

“Nightwing,” Kara tells her. “Vohc, the Builder. Cythonna, the goddess of ice and death.” And then, under her breath, soft enough that Alex has to question whether or not she’s heard right, “…Kara.”

A moment of silence follows, before Alex speaks.

“…What?”

Kara repeats herself, the word is uttered with something of an embarrassed air, which leads to some speculation, on Alex’s part.

“That’s…did your…you’re named after a _god?_ ”

“ _No,_ ” Kara asserts. “I was named after the constellation,” she says, but then, has to add, “which…was named after the god.”

“So that’s actually a yes.”

Kara sighs.

“I _told_ you, everyone back home was really into space, okay? It was like a whole… _tradition_.”

“To name your kid after gods?”

“ _Constellations_.”

“Okay, okay, got it, constellations, not gods,” Alex is more than a little amused by Kara’s clear irritation. And, she knows she shouldn’t, but she _has_ to ask.

“So. What exactly was Kara the goddess of?”

“Nothing.”

“I find that hard to believe.”

There’s a frustrated sigh, followed by some mumbling.

“What was that?”

“… _Beauty.”_

Alex laughs. Hard. Out loud.

“Oh, _okay,_ I think I’ve got a new nickname for you.”

“Al _-ex_ ,” Kara whines.

“That's—oh my gosh, that’s amazing. That's—” the pillow hits her face with expert precision, and _oh,_ it is so _on_.

But before Alex can enact her revenge, Jeremiah yells from down the hall.

“ _School. Night.”_

And Alex—who is, by that point, poised for a counter attack—freezes, and the whole thing is silly enough to have Kara suppressing giggles, and so of course Alex has to stifle her _own_ laughter, and then Jeremiah is threatening to send Eliza in.

“ _Ssshhhh_ ,” Alex tosses the pillow back at Kara and dives back under the covers. Kara puts the pillow back where it should be, all the while trying _very hard_ not to laugh.

“Quiet in there, I mean it!”

Alex takes a deep breath in through her nose, and smiles up at their makeshift Kryptonian night sky.

“'Night, _goddess of beauty,”_ she laughs. Kara snorts.

“Night, _Alexandra_.”

**Author's Note:**

> \- The name thing is a Silver Age bit, it doesn’t seem like this piece of Kryptonian culture appears elsewhere in comics, though.  
> \- Apologies for the weird shifts in POV, this is the result of four different drafts being stitched together at 3AM.  
> \- Not inspired by Clark’s stars from Superman Returns, just a happy coincidence.


End file.
